September 11, 2002
remembering the unforgettable
I'm sure almost anyone who's keeping a journal or
website would not forget to write their recollections about today a year ago. The planes.
The World Trade Center. The Pentagon. And all three thousand two hundred twenty eight
lives lost on that day. All their families.
I could be a selfless bitch for not being so deeply moved by the attacks, today or the
months before or even on the day itself. I could cite the reason being that I'm not a US
citizen, nor did I lose someone I love that day. In fact, on the other side of the world,
I had even celebrated two birthdays before I sat down at the dinner table and received a
phone call. My friend told me that I finally have a reason to watch the news.
But I think the real reason I can't bring myself to feel the ghosts that day has carried
till now is that I didn't allow myself to be overwhelmed by the media. Granted, September
11 and the days after became the media's favourite subject of intense scrutiny. Chain
e-mails of mourning, interviews, dedications, celebrities, live coverage, newspaper
headlines, charity to the families of the victims-turned-heroes, blow-by-blow accounts,
and new website layouts ensured that not a single person on earth would forget September
11 2001.
With all the media hype sometimes it can be
too easy to get swept up in the drama. I do feel sympathy for the victims and their
families. It's just that, I know there were worser tragedies than this.
The millions dead in Cambodian genocide, the Native Americans, the tribes wiped out by
Spanish conquistadors, and more in wars, religious or not. In my mind I've automatically
placed Sept 11 on this scale. What does it matter to me whether it was one of the first
major attacks on US soil?
If the people back then had the capability that our mass media has today and granted past
events of terror the same amount of coverage and fuss Sept 11 has received, we would be
able to see the big picture clearly. We wouldn't have lost our focus.
What I do know is that September 11 does not give reason to President George Bush to use the excuse of 'war against terror' as an excuse to target Muslims. I know that I didn't like how the US felt that the one-day attacks of Sept 11 gave them authority for them to bend or break the rules. I didn't like that governments all over the world weren't as sensible as they're supposed to be about the matter. The senseless attacks on Afghanistan has wiped out far more people than the number of Pentagon, WTC and plane crash victims altogether. Is that maturity? Some kind of victim percentage interest? It definitely cannot be the tit-for-tat world we'd all like it to be sometimes, and 'revenge' doesn't take us far at all. Why not grieve for those innocent citizens of Afghanistan that were murdered too?
If we feel that we have to fight for peace, that more war would solve the havoc previous wars have caused, and that innocents should suffer as a cause of someone else's actions, then we really haven't progressed as much as we'd like to think we have.
As tragic as 9.11 was, the after-effects were
arguably more tragic. The news say one overtly-passionate group of Muslims got too intense
and took it out on America, yes. Why not judge them as individuals? Why stick the label
'Islam' on their foreheads and then proceed to tarnish the name of the religion itself? I
think it's a huge misconception. Nobody should point fingers at the attackers'
(terrorists's?) religion and criticise everyone else who are followers of that religion.
They should point at the attackers, the people truly involved.
And absolutely no one else.